“We had excellent momentum in our sales during the first two months of the year (2017) after gaining awareness from our holiday sales and taking part in New York Fashion Week. We were flourishing. In the month of March, we were hearing crickets. I had been pushing hard on sales and broadening our reach, but I was sensing that wasn’t the answer. Instead of searching for a way to get more sales, I began to search for a way to nurture our existing audience.” — Meg Delagrange

Urban Southern is a leather handbag company run by Founder, Regina Bauman, and Marketing Director, Meg Delagrange. These fabulous cousins grew up Amish and their unique experiences set them and their brand apart. These bags are gorgeous, full grain leather carefully and lovingly designed, produced, and marketed.

While I can’t rave enough about the bags, Urban Southern is really about community, something that other lifestyle brands can’t touch.

Creating a marketing strategy for an up and coming brand that’s already doing some amazing stuff was a serious challenge. Urban Southern’s content is on point, their social media is on point, and they already have some really effective influencer campaigns.

So what on earth could I help them with?

Meg said it best…. They were looking to push sales, but quickly realized that wasn’t the answer. We needed to nurture the US audience, and the sales would come organically. With this flip in mindset, a few things emerged.

Rewards

Humans love being rewarded, right? Dropbox grew at an unprecedented rate by offering people more storage space for free when their friends signed up through their links. It’s a great concept!

So we used UpViral to set up a campaign for Urban Southern where a person could sign up, get their own personal link, and once 5 people signed up through their link they would get a $15 off coupon.

Sounds great, right? Well, it totally flopped.

The idea is that it would have a domino effect, but it didn’t. Only about 60 people signed up and then the progress completely flat lined. Less than five people actually earned the coupon.

Not that we weren’t happy to have another 60 people on the email list and a few people who wanted to make a purchase because they had a coupon, but the results from this strategy were less than stellar.

It might be one to loop back around to next year once the roster of Urban Southern brand advocates increases.

Email

“After a few minutes of discussing ideas about how to bring more value to our audience, she asked what we were doing to nurture our email list. Besides setting up a welcome series for our welcome list and sending out occasional newsletters and sales updates, we had nothing. I felt frustrated. I knew I could be doing more with our email lists. As we were talking, the idea of doing a weekly encouragement email came up. I decided to send a plain text #WinWednesday email out to our list the following Wednesday morning.” — Meg Delagrange

Why plain text? Well, most people get bombarded with emails every day. Images don’t always show up, especially for those who check their messages on their phones. Also, no matter how pretty images are, they can make a simple email appear and feel like a sales message. (Even if it’s not.)

Stripping out the images is the first and important step to truly nurturing your prospects with your email list. The next big step is to stop selling to them and start talking to them.

“We’ve only missed one week since then. Almost every week, replies pour in. Women tell us how much they’ve begun to look forward to Wednesday morning emails. Several women have started their own weekly #WinWednesday posts or live videos to celebrate Wednesday morning wins with their friends!” -Meg Delagrange

Not only was #WinWednesday an amazing community builder for Urban Southern, but that new sense of trust and brand loyalty also helped to drive sales. Two months after starting this email campaign, the brand saw a 75% increase in revenue.

This list now has a subscribe rate of 400% and an open rate of 22.6%.

Live Video

Not enough brands are harnessing the power of live video streaming. Facebook’s platform is powerful, so we decided to utilize it for Urban Southern by setting up a weekly “show”.

The show would be the same time and day every week, so the US audience knows when to show up. Consistency is key here. There’s some serious value in entertainment, but what would they do on camera? What would they talk about?

Well, at its heart, Urban Southern is a brand that builds a strong sense of community allowing its community members to empower one another. It’s for every woman. They don’t just sell bags, they sell a lifestyle. So what would they do on camera? They’d be themselves.

We named the show “Out of the Bag”, and every week Regina and Meg would take fun things out of different bags that they sell. Whatever was in there would lead to an activity or larger conversation. They made snacks. They shared travel tips. They painted. They even made a bag.

And their audience LOVED it.

The first episode on June 6 drew in around 10 live viewers. Fast forward to the last week of August and their live shows are playing in front of more than 70 live viewers. The video where they made a bag live garnered a whopping 6,800 views in two weeks time.

This is some serious brand awareness for a small company, and it’s even helped them increase their social proof. Says Meg, “Since people automatically get asked to leave a recommendation after watching a live stream, we’ve seen a large increase in reviews have been pouring in.”

Can’t stop, won’t stop!

Everyone is doing digital marketing, but not many brands are doing it well. Most of the time, it’s because they spend so much time listening to the masters, they’re convinced there’s a formula to achieve success and sales online.

There’s not.

The key is to know who your customers are and what they need from you. In the case of Urban Southern, their audience needed to be nurtured. I helped them come up with strategies that would do this….. and not everything worked! But that’s ok. We kept working until we found the strategies that worked for the brand AND the audience.

Sales in August 2017 were up 220% from sales in March when we started working together. What small brand wouldn’t kill for numbers like that?

Let’s be clear…. I didn’t create this success. Meg and Regina did. They wrote all those #WinWednesday emails. They planned and executed those live Facebook shows. They talked to their community and created strong relationships that led to unyielding brand advocacy.

Together we uncovered the strategies that would unleash the power of their already growing community and they executed on those strategies to make for a wildly successful year.

“Pouring our time and energy into nurturing our existing audience and looking for ways to bring them value has built a community of incredibly loyal folks who are highly engaged in what we are doing. From the beginning, we knew that neither of us would feel truly satisfied if we were only selling a product and then hanging up our hats for the day. We knew that we needed a greater purpose to come together, a purpose that would be much greater than us, a purpose to make the world a better place, a purpose to empower others.

Investing in consultations with other business professionals has helped us sharpen and refine our focus to deliver some pretty incredible results. We’re just getting started.” — Meg Delgrange

Originally published at makingmoxie.com on September 3, 2017.

We know small business is big — after all, it drives the American economy. But, while you have big dreams for your small biz, it can feel impossible to run your business the way you want to.

While I can’t fix inventory or tech woes, my experience in online marketing has taught me actionable ways small business owners can take control of their marketing efforts.

It’s time to stop being reactive and get proactive. However, marketing isn’t as easy as it seems, and I see a lot of brands every day that are checking a bunch of boxes, but not really doing anything that will gain them recognition or sales.

Here is where to start:

1. Small brands don’t know their buyer

Once upon a time I was on a consult call and when I asked who the client’s customer is. A pretty run of the mill question, right? His response almost made me choke: “People who like Dollar Shave Club and Bic…. basically anyone who shaves.”

So this guy is telling me to market his product to every human over the age of twelve?! I don’t think so.

Small businesses HAVE to know who their buyer is. And, more importantly, understand the difference between your ideal customer and who is actually buying your product.

Lots of small brands market according to this “perfect customer” and aren’t spending any time giving their actual customers what they need. This prevents the formation of communities around a brand, which is essential for true growth.

By using Google and Facebook analytics, customer surveys and web plug-ins, you can understand who your customer is, where they’re buying from and what they’re looking for.

You have to know someone before you sell to them.

2. All the “Business-centric” social posts

Small business mistake #2 is when brands don’t really know what to post, so they only talk about themselves.

I’ve seen it. You’ve seen it. We’ve all seen it. Company social pages that you have to unfollow because it bores you to death. On social media they share their own sales, their own accolades, and basically anything that happens to them.

It’s like being stuck at a dinner with someone who interrupts you every 20 seconds to talk about themselves.

It’s lame, and it adds zero value to your day.

Bottom line, social media is powerful, so use it correctly. Revisit the paragraph above. Do you know who your customers are? If you do, then you can start producing content (blogs, videos, podcasts, images, etc. The sky’s the limit!) that actually appeals to them and enriches their experience.

3. Failing to Mix It Up

It may be cliche to use this quote, but I’m going to do it anyway because it’s super, super relevant.

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

If you are posting on social media and not getting any business, your social strategy isn’t working.

If you are sending out mailers and not getting calls, your print strategy isn’t working.

If you are emailing your subscribers and aren’t seeing great open rates or click through rates, your email strategy isn’t working.

If you are paying for advertisements in newspapers or magazines, but you can’t attribute this to any rise in sales, your advertising isn’t working.

Too many small business owners have it in their heads that “this is the way things are done.” Hate to break it to you, but the businesses that reach new heights are the ones disrupting their industries, not the ones following the playbook.

4. Doing too many things

Facebook. Instagram. Twitter. Pinterest. Snapchat. Blogging. Video. Tumblr. LinkedIn. Medium. Influencer Marketing. Workshops. Webinars. Email newsletters. Live videos. Infographics. YouTube. Case studies. Podcasts. Guides. Worksheets. Checklists. Ebooks. Landing pages. Sales funnels.

There’s a lot to do when it comes to marketing online. You don’t, however, have to do it all. In fact, you shouldn’t! Nothing will end up getting done well.

Based on what your customers need and where they hang out, choose 3–4 marketing strategies to start. If you master them, add another to the roster! Just be sure you’re super effective with the strategies and platforms you’re using first.

Don’t know where your customers hang out? Let’s schedule a consult call.

So what can you do?

Nothing is more essential than getting a really detailed picture of who your customers are. Do the research. Look at the analytics. Talk to the people.

From here, the next step would be to put a strategy in place. Make sure you are being smart about the use of your time and resources and aren’t spreading yourself too thin. Everything you do should have a purpose, and that purpose should serve your customers well.

Have a specific marketing question you’d love to see me blog about? Drop me a line, and I’ll add it to my content calendar!

Originally published at makingmoxie.com on August 30, 2017.

We can all kneel at the altar of the royalty of entrepreneurship like Garyvee, Arianna Huffington, and Richard Branson. I get it. They’re inspiring as hell, and who doesn’t love a good success story? Especially when you think you can recreate what they’ve been able to achieve.

Here’s your first truth bomb: you can’t.

Not trying to be a Debbie Downer here, but there’s been this crazy idea circulated that if you simply work hard enough, you’ll be successful.

Sorry, but it’s not that simple.

No one alive is like Garyvee or Sir Branson or Arianna. Not you, not me…. Nobody! Yes, you should get educated and get inspired, but living and pushing forward in business solely on the messaging of others is only going to hold you back.

It’s all about the hustle, baby (sort of)

If you follow Garyvee at all, you know that the man is a machine. He worked his ass off for years and years and years to get where he is now. He didn’t spend money; he didn’t go out with friends; he didn’t do anything but concentrate on ways to scale the family wine business.

The man is a badass, no doubt, but this is seriously unrealistic for the majority of us…. Not to mention unhealthy.

There’s nothing wrong with working hard, but only concentrating on business isn’t going to guarantee success. Take the 15-year-old flip flop millionaire for example. You can’t tell me that she hustled for years…. She barely had any years by the time she made her money!

Getting where you need to be is a combo of a few things: hard work, innovative ideas, and investing your time and resources wisely. Most people can’t manage all three.

So be sure to hustle, but be super intentional about how you spend your time. (It’s the most important asset you have!) Hustling for the sake of “the hustle” or “the grind” so you can post pictures of Lambo’s on Instagram is pretty useless.

And while you’re hustling, remember that there’s always more to consider….

Actually, it IS okay to have some balance

The one thing I can’t stand about Garyvee’s messaging is the single-mindedness. No doubt that the man is amazing, but dedicating yourself to business 200% is not right for most people.

I don’t know about you, but I have a family I adore. I like to go out occasionally for a drink, and whenever there’s extra money in the bank account, my family takes off for the weekend for some much-deserved travel.

Personally, I think it’s tough to thrive in business if you’re all about business all the time.

I’ve seen more than one person brag about working long days and not stopping on the weekend. This doesn’t make you the best entrepreneur the world’s ever seen; it probably just means that you’re not super effective or efficient.

Did you know that taking breaks at work and taking breaks from work is the best thing you can do for your business?

This is one cliche that’s very true: work smarter, not harder because there’s no shame in acknowledging your humanness.

“Success” doesn’t look the same to everyone

You’re not the only one who gets distracted by dollar signs. It’s definitely human nature to look at lives of luxury and covet that pretty picture. Really, who doesn’t want more disposable income and beautiful things?

Amongst all these “success” stories blasted into our newsfeeds on the daily, you have to remember one simple thing: not everyone defines success the same way.

Maybe you’ll feel successful if you can take your family on a big vacation every year or if you can save up for that car you’ve always dreamed of. Maybe success means landing your ideal client or raising well-rounded children who contribute to society.

Bottom line: you can’t define your own success by what you see other people achieve, and you certainly can’t define success by a number in your bank account.

You don’t need a legacy

Legacy is the new buzzword in business circles, so you’ve probably got it on the brain lately…. Which means you may not appreciate this next truth bomb very much.

You don’t need a legacy.

If you want one, if that’s a personal goal in your life, then fine. You do you. But truly, it’s enough to build and run a business that makes you feel fulfilled without saving the rainforest or leaving something for your kids.

My kids are one reason I do not want to leave a business legacy, in fact! They are already proving to be smart, strong young people, and I want them to walk the path that brings them the most joy…. Not the path I’ve laid out for them.

Also, hard work and some struggle builds character. I don’t plan to deprive them of important character-building activities by handing them a business when they’re grown.

Again, if legacy is something you want to create with your life, you should, but just because everyone else is talking about it doesn’t mean you have to do it too.

You’ve got this, entrepreneur!

Stop talking about it and actually do it. The process is going to happen whether or not you document it. It’s ok if you can’t match the video output of Garyvee or the content creation a la Arianna. Don’t get sidetracked by the gurus.

The journey looks different for all of us, so don’t get so caught up in someone else’s and forget your own. Listen to the wisdom of others, but make your own truths. Business will always be there; don’t be too busy playing “the game” that you forget to be a good business owner and create a life worth living.

Originally published at makingmoxie.com on July 31, 2017.

Social media is hard. (That’s probably why a lot of businesses still aren’t using it.) For the brands who are on social media, the majority aren’t doing it well. Let me give you an example:

Follows social calendar. Posts on Facebook three times a week. Instagram once a day. Twitter once a day. Shares blog posts.

Where’s the value here? In the blog posts…. Maybe?

It’s a system, for sure, but not one that focuses on human behavior and creating true connections.

If you want to build traction for your brand in the digital world, you need to rethink that way you’re attacking social media….. And then you need to do just that. Attack it.

1. Make sure your content is worth consuming

Value is probably my favorite buzzword in the world. Love it to death. It’s probably totally cliche to ask everyone to be “valuable” all the time, but it’s important. So I’ll just keep doing it.

Unfortunately, most small businesses aren’t focused on creating value on social media. They just post shit about themselves because they feel like social media is something that they “have to do”. (It’s not.)

Don’t create content for the sake of creating content. You can bet your ass if you don’t care about what you’re producing, no one else will either.

If you’re creating content for SEO, it’ll be garbage.

If you’re creating content because you’re trying to sell someone on something, it’ll be garbage.

If you’re creating content because that’s what everyone else is doing, it’ll be garbage.

Seeing a pattern here?

So whether you’re writing a long form blog post or throwing up a quick post on Facebook, make sure it will be something to entertain, educate, or positively affect your audience. I can’t tell you what that “thing” is. You can only discover it by truly understanding what your buyer needs, not what you want to tell them.

2. Keep your audience informed

The funny thing about social media is that people actually expect you to be social there. This means that you can’t simply post every blog post that you produce. That will get boring…. And fast.

Turns out, you’re not the only expert in your field.

It’s your job to keep your people informed, even if that means sharing content from others. (You should ALWAYS be sharing content from other sources!)

Furthermore, you should be talking to your people about what you post. Engaging in active conversations. Marketing, these days, is all about connection and human interaction. And guess what? Most people learn best by talking things through, so you’ll do the most good by giving your audience something to talk about.

3. Do something they won’t expect

Most businesses or influencers do the same things on social media. The same kinds of engagement posts. The same kinds of videos. The same kinds of ads.

“The people who are killing it on social media are the ones who set the trends, not the ones who follow them.”

By the time you get on board with some new strategy, the tide will have turned and there will be a new “best practice”. You can advance your business and your audience by digging deep, thinking creatively, and finding new ways to use social media.

So consider this:

• What’s a different way that you can utilize Facebook live to showcase your product, service, or message? Instead of just talking into the camera, do things like interviews, showcase ways to use your product, dance or do something silly. (There’s value in entertainment, ya’ll.)
• Instagram stories are an excellent way to break down barriers and let your audience have a glimpse into the real person and real life of your business.
• Engagement posts don’t have to all look the same. This post from Brianne Huntsman is one of my absolute favs.

4. Don’t be afraid to ask

When we get into business mode, we want to be the authority. We want everyone to look at us for information, inspiration, and expertise. That’s all well and good, but the truth is that no matter how knowledgeable anyone is, they simply don’t know it all.

Acknowledge this. It makes you more powerful.

Never be afraid to ask your audience for something. They may have answers or insight that you hadn’t had the capacity to consider before.

Furthermore, it’s incredibly arrogant to assume you know what everyone needs. If you don’t take the time to engage with your audience and actually ask what they want/need from you, you won’t ever be super effective on social media.

Social media is one of your most powerful tools

Brand are unique, just like human beings. Each one has it’s own flavor, tonality, and value. Most brands see social media as a box they need to check on the daily to do list, but if you take a step back and realize that social media is a place for you to create community, it’s easier to see that the only way to succeed is to treat it like a giant networking event.

You are running this event, so use your personal creativity and the brilliant minds of your teammates to determine the best, most unique ways to make it an excellent place for your people to be.

Originally published at makingmoxie.com on July 13, 2017.

Ok, so SEO isn’t dead exactly, but it’s got a much different role in digital marketing today than it had five years ago. Everyone wants solid SEO so their site can rank in search and get more leads. Makes sense, but it’s just not that simple.

Truth be told, if you have a small business or a startup, SEO is going to be a big waste of your time and limited resources.

Simply put: you can’t compete.

Once you realize that SEO is not a good investment into your business, you can discover other digital strategies that will actually yield a return on investment…. And much, much more.

SEO doesn’t pack the same punch

It’s not as easy as it once was to rank with solid SEO. Not too long ago, you needed to be on top of the Google search results to get any traffic. Furthermore, not everyone had hopped on the SEO bandwagon yet, so you could rank.

I’ve had recent clients who were diligent, did everything right, no blackhat tactics — and still couldn’t make any significant progress. It made them angry and confused, but the lack of forward motion made sense, and here’s why:

• No matter how well you’re doing SEO, your competitors are probably doing the exact same thing. The competition is too intense and too similar.
• Creating value is important, but unless you’re doing something unique, you’re probably just contributing to all the noise.
• You can’t beat the big dogs in search. The Amazon’s, Target’s, and Hubspot’s of the world will outrank you every single time.
• Just being on the first page isn’t good enough anymore. While the top Google listing still gets about 1/3 of all clicks, the organic results earning the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th spot now receive the other 63% of the clicks, leaving only 4% of clicks for anything lower. (Via Business 2 Community)

You don’t need to rank, you need to create conversions

Now here’s what small business owners need to hear before they go throwing their hard-earned cash away trying to optimize their websites…. Ranking in itself isn’t profitable.

If you happen to be ranking for the right keywords and are getting attention from the right people, there’s still a chance that those visitors aren’t connecting with your brand on the first touch point — which means you’ll never hear from them again.

Traffic to your website, in and of itself, is not valuable.

What will really increase your bottom line is conversions. (Sales, email subscribers, Facebook follows, contact forms sent out, etc.)

You get these things by truly connecting with people. What’s the best online solution for forging relationships with other humans? You guessed it…. Social media.

I don’t really care which social channel you choose. The takeaway here is that you need to prioritize social media to get the brand awareness you crave.

The days of the SERPs supreme reign are gone

So what has changed? Well, social media has greatly influenced not only the way we communicate, but also how we discover new brands online. What’s more, we rely on social media more heavily today than ever before.

Yes, searches are still driving traffic for lots of things. Google is the place to go if you need to find a local nail salon, Miami hotel suggestions, or if you need to know if that slight cough you have is actually a deadly disease in disguise.

However, the vast majority of small brands really don’t have a hope for getting the attention or market share they need via search engines.

Another massive problem with relying on search engines for traffic is that, depending on what you sell, your audience may not even know that they need what you offer. (If they don’t know they need it, they won’t be searching for it in the first place, now will they?)

Word of mouth is where it’s at

Word of mouth is still the best way to reach people. A raving review from a trusted friend is the easiest way to reach people and to create a community of advocates around your brand. You can do all of this on social media, because social is the new word of mouth.

According to HostingFacts.com, e-commerce sales from social media grew by 202% in 2014 and is expected to increase further. Certainly not everyone who reads this will have an e-commerce business, but you get the point…. Social media is powerful. Today, it’s more powerful than search engine optimization.

No, succeeding at social isn’t easy. You won’t do it by posting X amount of times per platform per week. But if you invest your time and resources into creating a strong (and engaging!) social presence, the return on investment will be much more than you can expect with SEO.

Are you currently utilizing SEO as an inbound marketing strategy? What have your results looked like? Your wins? Your frustrations?

About the Author: Shauna Armitage, Chief Creative at Making Moxie

Shauna is a creative mind who loves to put her brain to work to help small businesses develop brilliant marketing initiatives. Mother to 3, wife to 1, she spends her spare time traveling with her brood and finding new places to order cheeseburgers.

Originally published at makingmoxie.com on July 2, 2017.

Not everyone is cut out for working remotely. There are, however, a few habits you can adapt to become successful with this lifestyle.

Almost 10 years ago I graduated from college. I was ready to get my first big girl job, but it wasn’t long before confusion and frustration crept in. No one was interested in hiring me. Hell, I could barely score an interview.

I panicked.

I switched gears and got a second BA.

That didn’t help either.

A family member suggested becoming a virtual assistant. Desperate to use my degrees instead of waiting tables, I decided to give it a try.

I landed my first gig within two weeks. A week later, I scored another one. I was actually pretty good at this.

The virtual work revolution

The traditional route of going to college, grabbing an entry level position, and then working your way up the corporate ladder isn’t as cut and dry as it was made to appear when we were kids. In recent years, many people have been forced to think outside the box when it comes to their careers.

I was one of them.

It led me down a different path, and one that I rather enjoy. While not being accepted into the general workforce was a blessing in disguise, working from home was not as easy as I thought it would be. In fact, it’s actually hard to manage.

It can be done, however, and here’s how….

1. Create boundaries

I’m a parent, which means there’s basically no time of day that’s just “mine”. Originally I thought, “Hey! Best of both worlds. I can work AND have my kids with me!”

Oh how naive I was….

Working from home is, in fact, work. Children are also work. How successful were you last time you tried to tackle two very important jobs simultaneously? Not very, I’m guessing.

The first thing you need to do when you work virtually is set realistic boundaries. This can be anything from the number of hours you work in a day, to the time of day you work, to committing to a hard cut off at dinner time so you can spend time with your loved ones.

Work is important, but so is everything else. If you don’t create strong boundaries, the lines will get blurred, and you’ll find that you’re unsuccessful in both your professional and personal life.

2. Get out of the house

I won’t lie to you, being able to sit on my couch and work in my pajamas doesn’t suck. It can get a bit monotonous, though. It’s a good idea to force yourself out into the light of day now and again.

Working from home all the time can make you feel isolated, which of course isn’t ideal. Taking your computer to a park or a local coffee shop once a week is an easy and attractive solution.

While working from home can be amazing, there’s really something about putting on pants and joining the rest of the world that’s good for the soul.

3. Make wellness a priority

I don’t need to explain to you how exercise is good for your body or your mind. But I can say, that when you have the freedom to work from your couch, it’s easy to let both your body and mind lapse a bit.

If you plan on being successful at this whole working from home thing, you’ve got to take a holistic approach, and that means taking care of your body.

It’s easy to grab snacks from the pantry and sit back down at your computer without missing a beat. It’s easy to get so into your work that you don’t notice you haven’t moved from your chair in roughly 10 hours.

Get a standing desk. Go to the gym BEFORE you start your work day. Don’t keep garbage snack foods in the house.

It’s very easy when you work on your own time to put so much effort into your work that you forget to put effort into yourself. It’s the little changes you make to your regular habits that will help you stay healthy, both body and mind.

4. Allow a little distraction

There’s tons of studies, statistics, and articles out there about how the workforce wastes time via all manner of little distractions. In the name of productivity, the powers that be try to lock that nonsense down. As a freelancer, however, you can embrace them.

For the same reason that people who vacation more tend to be more productive, giving your brain a break while you’re on the job is a good plan if you want to get things done. (And do them well.)

Throw on the headset and go for a walk while you talk to a client. After an hour of writing or strategizing, spend ten minutes mindlessly on Facebook. Once you complete a task, get down on the floor and do a few pushups.

It’s easy, when you work from home, to get tunnel vision and not look at the clock for eight hours straight. Distractions can clear your head so you can jump back into your work refreshed and at full capacity…. So feel free to create some little distractions for yourself during the day.

5. Strive for balance

When you work outside the home, there’s an end to your work day. You can leave the stress, the worry, the hurdles at the office.

It’s not so simple when you work from home because there’s no place that ISN’T your office.

One essential key to being a successful virtual worker is to create balance in your life. Even if you absolutely love your job, it’s only one aspect of your life. It’s only one aspect of your identity.

The rest of you needs to be nurtured, and if you don’t step away from work and respect the boundaries you’ve set for yourself, balance will be impossible.

Conclusion

Working from home or working remotely is most definitely a blessing, but it’s hard to do. It’s very hard to do well.

Whether you are your own boss or you do work for clients all over the globe, success starts at home. You can be a successful remote worker when you strive to be aware of how this untraditional route affects you and strive for a holistic approach in business and life.

5 Things You Should Do if You Want to Succeed While Working From Home was originally published in Thrive Global on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I recently wrote about how I won’t be saving for my kid’s college education and someone told me that was selfish. I can’t disagree. I think my reasons are valid, but some of them come from a selfish place, it’s true. My views on saving for my kid’s college aren’t the only thing about my parenting that could be considered selfish.

Have you ever met a mommy martyr? The kind of parent who works, is the class parent, is always at her toddler’s beck and call, and clearly hasn’t slept in approximately five to ten years? This parent is always on point, but never seems to be able to do anything for herself. You want to hug this poor woman and slap her all at the same time. Better yet, you want to give her a glass of wine.

Being a “selfish” parent isn’t a bad thing. Sometimes it’s about self preservation, like the days I can’t possibly listen to another one of my six-year-old’s stories about Minecraft because my brain can’t handle the utter nonsense. Or the days when I put my screaming, thrashing toddler safely in her crib instead of throwing her out the window. There are even days when we get fast food because I’m way too tired to even consider cooking real food. Being “selfish” is often what’s necessary to maintain your sanity, and just being a parent will test your ability to stay sane on a regular basis.

Other days, being a selfish parent is a bit more serious. Choosing not to spend an hour after dinner playing trains might have given you the chance to get laundry done, but it also probably gave your kid the chance to develop some independence. Your refusal to purchase that birthday toy you know your kid is excited about now but will never touch might just give him the chance to save up his allowance and feel the pride of working hard for something he wants — a very valuable experience for a kid.

What about those vacations you take without your kids? I know lots of people who think this is a selfish move, and maybe it is, but your relationship with your spouse, partner, or even just other adults matters not just to your wellbeing, but happy, connected parents will likely affect the wellbeing of your kids as well.

Simply put, lots of parenting decisions could be considered selfish ones depending on who you talk to, but they could be doing you and your kids a great deal of good in the long run.

The time I take for myself each week — whether it be a hot bath while my husband handles homework or skipping that second chapter of the bedtime story in favor of Netflix — gives me the space and clarity I need to tackle parenting at full capacity on a regular basis. My kids aren’t lacking anything because I opt to buy the cupcakes from the bakery aisle at the store instead of making them at 1am when I get a break from work. They aren’t suffering because I got myself a new nail polish this week. They definitely aren’t suffering when the extra time I’ve had to do laundry, cook, clean, and finish my work assignments gives me the patience and energy for an extra hour of board games and ice cream cones.

While kids may be our whole world, the whole world isn’t about our kids. They need to know that, and parents need to feel like it’s ok to take care of their own personal needs. Give and take is a huge part of being a parent, and most days it’s way more give. Some take is certainly allowed, and you if you are a bit selfish, you might just be a better parent for it.

Originally published at thevioletmoon.com on April 7, 2016.

One day, a friend asked if my 5-year-old could come to church with them. She was shocked when my husband and I agreed wholeheartedly. She truly thought we would be offended, like she was trying to brainwash him or something. It was quite the contrary actually. We thought learning about Christianity was a critical piece of his religious education — and religious education is something that all kids should have — but not just about one religion.

We want our kids to be Godless because we want them to be open-minded and thoughtful when it comes to other belief systems that may not match their own. We want them to be educated about how others feel about the world so they can be accepting of everyone.

Whether you want to admit it or not, there isn’t one God. People all over the world believe in different gods, different codes, different afterlives. Regardless of what the truth may be, each and every person’s belief system is what is real to them — it’s their truth. It’s essential for kids to respect the truths of others.

Regardless of who is right and who is wrong, there seems to be a basic set of morals that every religion subscribes to, and that’s what we teach our children. To be kind. To do the right thing even if it’s the hard thing. To treat other people the way they want to be treated. To work hard. To take care of others. The list goes on and on.

One day our children are going to be adults. They are going to have to decide for themselves what their truth is, where their faith lies. It would certainly be easier if they believed what we believe, but there’s no guarantee that they will, and that’s ok. What’s most important to us is that they grow up to be good people, and that above all, they have faith in themselves.

Originally published at thevioletmoon.com on March 26, 2016.

After the procedure, I did a lot of talking about it. I really needed to talk, and I think there were a lot of people that needed to listen. It helped me heal. My husband, however, didn’t have much to say.

He cried the day we got the news, but I never saw him cry again. He was so incredibly focused on my needs and my health before, during, and after. He really took care of me. It’s understandable since I was carrying the baby and had to be the one to experience losing her physically, but I was alone in that respect only. This loss was his loss too.

The words of encouragement I received after Violet’s death were overwhelming. People came out of the woodwork to share their own personal hardship or simply to let me know that they understood and they supported me, and I couldn’t have been more grateful. But my husband never got that. No one called to check on him. No one reached out to tell him how brave he was. No one acknowledged that he also lost a piece of his heart that day — and he did. She was just as much his little girl as she was mine, and the loss of her rocked him to his core, even if he wan’t talking about it openly like I was.

Our society has a way of glorifying fathers who participate in parenting like they’ve done something exceptional. Fathers aren’t babysitters with a genetic tie to their charges, they are parents with the same exact responsibilities, fears, and challenges that mothers have. They have an equal stock in their children as mothers, and it’s important to acknowledge that in the best of times, the most regular of times, and especially in the worst of times.

You can certainly believe that losing Violet has taken its toll on me, but I hate that very few people have thought about what that loss has meant for her father — because that’s exactly what he is. He isn’t simply my husband, my partner, or that guy who keeps the kids alive when I’m out and about. He’s a person, a man, and a parent who is deeply connected and invested in all his children. Every. Single. One.

Originally published at thevioletmoon.com on March 17, 2016.

The years flew by and Bug was a very content little creature. He played with his toys and observed how everything worked. We baked together, took walks, and stayed pretty busy. By the time he was 18 months he did get some cartoon time in the morning. He also liked to poke at every adult’s smartphone. (We’re obsessed with them, why wouldn’t we expect our kids to be too?) When the family watched shows after dinner, he sat with his back to the screen and watched his little cars whoosh down the track before him. All was well.

By the time he was three, we noticed that he was showing his grandparents how to use their iPad, which was weird to my husband and I because we didn’t know how to use an iPad either. We started traveling a decent amount to visit family and let him play with the Kindle while out on the road. The Christmas after he turned four he received a Nintendo 3DS. After the initial excitement of the holiday wore thin, he only used it on long car or plane rides. All was well.

Right before Bug’s fifth birthday, my daughter was born and if we thought our lives changed with our firstborn, the second was a huge shock. I was out of practice with this parenting thing — big time. When she turned one and her personality started forming in earnest, he quickly discovered that she was a whole different animal.

Bug went off to school that fall and I started working from home full time. Things were beyond crazy, but we liked it that way. All of a sudden I found myself putting the Nugget in the highchair and turning on Elmo so I could squeeze in an extra hour of work. Nap time simply wasn’t enough time to really get anything accomplished, and she refused to sit and play while I worked like her brother did. Getting anything accomplished while she was conscious was becoming more than just a struggle. If I was going to feed these children, I needed to work, dammit.

Now that she’s 18 months, Nugget knows how to work a smartphone and her big brother’s tablet. When coloring bores her, my husband and I often let her have one or the other when we go out to dinner so we can have some adult conversation without having to worry about a toddler shrieking because she can’t get the straw she’s pulled out of the cup — 80 times or so now — back into the top. (Can you imagine?!)

Today the focus is less on banning technology from the house than on doing technology right. My son plays Minecraft because of all the video games out there, it’s pretty educational. He also enjoys a little PBSkids.org when he is granted access to the computer, which is basically like the Holy Grail in my household. My daughter gets some TV time once a day, and it’s always a show that will teach her something. We’ve decided to embrace the screens in our home, and I think it was a good call.

It felt so much easier to have standards with baby #1. Maybe it’s his personality; maybe it’s mine. To me fair, life has changed quite a bit since I was a new mom. I’m a bit older, possibly slightly wiser, I work full time now and I didn’t before. Having a child in school changes the game completely. If I’ve learned anything over the years, it’s how to survive each day — sometimes a little technology goes a long way to keep the hubs and I sane, so I refuse to feel badly about that. Also, technology is a huge part of my — of everyone’s — lives. We can’t expect our kids not to notice. For about one hour a day, Sesame Street or Doc McStuffins is my babysitter, and the boy gets to build things with a controller instead of with his hands. They also read, build with blocks, and play with cars. They go for hikes every weekend and help me cook dinner. (Yes, the 18-month-old helps cook dinner. It’s a disaster.) You know what? My kids are healthy, happy, and incredibly loved, and the screen time doesn’t change that.

Originally published at thevioletmoon.com on March 15, 2016.